


Good Goodneighbor

by fransoun



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: (it's not nice), Canon-Typical Violence, Drug Use, F/M, Gen, and because there was so much more that could have been done, and no husband either, at least not for this sole survivor, au - there is no son, but the institute is still after her so that's? nice?, with conrad kellogg in nick valentine's head
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-18
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-01-19 08:25:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12406740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fransoun/pseuds/fransoun
Summary: The Institute is after her, and she doesn't know why. She and Nick head to Goodneighbor to get some answers.Neither of them expect the answers would be leaving with them.





	1. Don't Check Your Guns at the Gate

"Ah."

It wasn't, thought Hancock as he wiped his knife against his coat, the reaction he usually got when he stabbed someone.

In his own defense, though, he didn't actually stab people that often. Hardly ever, really. Certainly not as often as his reputation would suggest - and only when they really deserved it.

Hancock stared down at the body. Finn had deserved it.

His jaw clenched. They were all responsible for their own choices in Goodneighbor, and they all had to live with the consequences. Finn had made his, and he had lived with it. 

Just not for very long.

Hancock turned his attention back to the newcomer.

She was a vaultie. That much was obvious, blindingly so, even though she wore the uniform of a Minuteman. A dog - and not one of the mangy, irradiated ferals that roamed the ruins outside Goodneighbor, but a healthy, fully-furred animal - pressed up against her side, patiently tolerating the fingers she'd twined tightly in its fur. The other hand crept slowly away from the handle of a pistol tucked through her belt as she looked between Hancock and the fallen Finn and back again. Hancock would bet she hadn't even realized she'd reached for it in the first place.

Back by the gate, Nick - good ol' dick Nick, the only decent soul left in Diamond City - leaned casually against the wall, a lit cigarette between his fingers, brought partway to his lips. His yellow eyes watched them both carefully.

Slowly she relaxed, ruffling the fur on the dog's head. It wagged its tail. 

Nick exhaled, smoke drifting from his lips and cheek.

Hancock moved again, carefully tucking away his own knife and approaching.

"You all right, sister?"

She nodded once and took a step towards him. Hancock held out his hand, put his most charming expression on his face - 

\- and then she was brushing past him, kneeling next to Finn's body. Her fingers touched his wrist, moved to his neck. Finally she reached up and closed his eyes, then sat back on her heels and looked up at him. "You killed him."

It wasn't quite a question. He grinned down at her. 

"You've got a good pair of eyes on ya. I think you'll fit in here just fine." 

She rose to her feet, adjusting a strap across her chest to resettle some of the gear she was carrying and looking around - from Kleo's to Daisy's, then up to the Statehouse and the ruins of Boston towering around them. "So this is...Goodneighbor?"

It was the first hint of tentativeness Hancock had seen in her, so he kept his tone friendly. And then, because that was a pistol in her belt and a rifle on her back, after all, he spread his hands and smiled - maybe a bit too wide. 

"That's right! So what brings you to our fine and friendly town?"

"I need to speak to - " She glanced quickly back at Nick and shifted the satchel at her side. "I'm looking for Doctor Amari."

"Ah, the Memory Den. Got a little something in your past you're trying to remember? Or maybe it's something you're trying to forget?"

She met his gaze, but didn't answer.

Hancock held up his hands. "Hey, Goodneighbor's of the people, for the people, you feel me? Everyone's welcome here." He paused. "Just so long as you remember who's in charge."

Nick stepped forward, touched the vaultie gently on the shoulder. "C'mon, kid. I know where we're headed." He raised his metal hand to the brim of his hat. "Hancock. Always a pleasure."

Hancock grinned at him. "Keep yourself safe, Nick."

They headed off down the narrow passage between the statehouse and Kleo's shop. As she passed Hancock, the vaultie stopped in front of him.

"Would Finn have really tried it?" she asked him. "That whole 'unfortunate accident in a back alley' thing?"

Hancock sighed. "Oh, probably. Finn never could figure out when he was getting over his head."

"Ah," she said, and it sounded almost the same as it had when Hancock had killed Finn.

She turned to follow after Nick, and then - 

"Thank you," she said quietly, meeting his eyes.

Hancock blinked, startled into a response. "You're welcome."

She smiled, an achingly genuine, barely-there curl of too-soft lips, and then she was gone, hurrying after Valentine.

He waited until she'd rounded the corner and then ambled after them, leaning up against the statehouse to watch them cross Scollay Square.

Hancock was good at noticing the little things.

It was what kept in him power around here. Who was trying to overthrow him? (Right now, Bobbi No-nose.) Who was moving in on Goodneighbor? (The Triggermen who'd taken over the warehouses. He'd put out a job on them to Charlie in The Third Rail, but so far, no takers.)

Right now, he was noticing the vault dweller.

As she kept pace with Nick, her eyes flicked to the neat row of mattresses under the eves of the Memory Den, to the communal pot tended by a drifter under the open sky.

It was like watching someone picking up broken pieces of glass - a beer bottle, or maybe one of those fancy old world mirrors - turning them over in her hands and trying to figure out how to fit them back together again.

Part of Hancock bristled. He'd worked hard to make Goodneighbor a safe place for everyone, and to make it a place where they could live life as they pleased. Goodneighbor might not have been the fanciest or the most well kept, but if she wanted _that_ , she could head right back over to Diamond City.

But all she did was look.

They reached the door of the Den. Nick, always the gentleman, held open the door for her, and they vanished into the dimness inside.

Hancock pushed himself off the wall and sauntered back around the corner of the Statehouse, nodding to a passing neighborhood watchman. He pushed open the the weathered door and climbed the creaking wooden staircase to the second floor. The room to the right, the one that opened up onto the Statehouse's balcony, had the best view of the commons below, so Hancock took up position next to one of the windows and settled in to wait.

Time passed. Hancock shifted. He reached into his pocket, pulled out an inhaler, and took a lazy puff of Jet. His eyes never left the Memory Den's door.

Eventually, the door opened, and a drifter in sunglasses wandered out. Hancock watched Fahrenheit step out of the shadow of a nearby building and cross the square to meet him. They spoke for a few moments, and then Fahrenheit dropped a handful of caps into an outstretched palm. The drifter strolled off in the direction of the communal pot while Fahrenheit headed for the Statehouse.

Hancock heard the floorboards creak when she stepped into the room, but he kept his eyes on the Memory Den. "What's the word?" 

"Seems like the newest piece on the board has gotten herself in a little trouble. That sack she was carrying? Turns out it had a synth brain in it."

Now Hancock did turn to face her. Fahrenheit had leaned herself up against the doorjamb and was using a knife to clean her fingernails, although she was clearly far more interested in the knife than the nails. 

"A synth brain?" He repeated incredulously.

"Synth, cyborg. Some sort of Institute tech." Fahrenheit waved the knife dismissively. "Whatever it is, she wants a look at what's on it, and Nick Valentine offered up his head to help."

Hancock raised his eyebrows. "Any idea why?"

"Our source said she's looking for a way into the Institute. Apparently she's trying to find out why they want her dead."

Hancock let out a low, disbelieving whistle.

"You want me to take care of her, boss?"

"Aw, Fahrenheit, not you too," he said, mock chastisement not quite hiding the gentle warning underneath. "She's a guest in Goodneighbor, remember? Besides, any enemy of the Institute is a friend of ours, even if she doesn't know it yet. But spread the word. I think I'll be making a little speech tonight…"


	2. Good Night Neighbor

Night had fallen by the time they stepped out of the Memory Den, and a light rain was falling from the darkened sky.

"Nick, are you _sure_ you're all right?" she asked for what felt like the hundredth time.

He sighed. "Kid, I told you, I'm _fine_. Are you sure you weren't just hearing things? You've been through the wringer lately, and none of that could have been easy on you, either."

"I was _not_ hearing things," she insisted. "It was Kellogg's voice - _you_ were talking with Kellogg's voice. You said - _he_ said - that he should have killed me when he had the chance."

She shivered, hoping Nick wouldn't notice, or if he did, that he'd write it off as the chill of the evening mist. She should have know better.

Nick's hand settled gently on her shoulder, and she looked up into warm yellow eyes. "Look, kid, I'll make you a deal. If it happens again, we'll come straight back to Amari to see if I've knocked a gear or two loose up here." He tapped the side of his head. "Deal?"

She sighed. She wasn't happy with it, but Nick was as stubborn as she was. This was all she was going to get. "Deal."

"All righty. Now let's get you - what's all this, then?"

She turned to look. A crowd had begun to gather in the small square in front of the Statehouse, in spite of the weather. 

A streetlamp cast a puddle of light onto the sidewalk in front of the Memory Den, splashing over the curb to spill into the street. She skirted the edge of it and pressed herself up against the crumbling brick facade of the old building, keeping dry and dark underneath its eaves.

She reached for the knob on the Pipboy strapped to her wrist, turning down the brightness until it was only a dull glow. Nick followed her, and in the dimness, his eyes and the glowing embers of his cigarette were the only pinpoints of light.

She shrugged off her pack and set it on the ground, rummaging around inside until she found the butcher-paper-wrapped brahmin meat she'd bought in Diamond City earlier that day. She slit the twine and tucked it carefully into her pocket, then placed the meat on the makeshift paper plate down on the ground next to her for Dogmeat to eat. While he dug in, she and Nick watched. 

And waited.

Movement caught her eye. The mayor - Hancock - had stepped out onto the balcony of the Statehouse.

It was a good speech. Hancock knew his audience. He could read their mood, adjust his words on the fly. They called out, and he responded. And they really seemed to be listening to what he was saying. They seemed to respect him.

The topic of the speech hit a little close to home, but she tried not to think too hard about that.

When it was over, and the crowd had dispersed, she knelt to gather the remnants of Dogmeat's meal, folding the paper up and binding it tightly with the twine from her pocket. She tucked it away and shouldered her rucksack, preparing to head out into the Fens.

Nick had other ideas.

"Food first, kid. Then we can hit the road."

She protested. "I have food, Nick."

"And here I was thinking it might be nice to eat someplace where the food was hot and the roof wasn't full of holes."

The thought of a meal eaten somewhere other than the dank, crumbling ruins of a building with water dripping down through the cracks in the ceiling was undeniably appealing.

She shifted from foot to foot, then sighed. "Lead the way."

 

After the damp darkness of the night, the air of The Third Rail felt warm and dry. 

A few heads turned their way as they descended the stairs, but the stares didn't linger long. Nick, she gathered, was a familiar enough face around Goodneighbor, and she was just another one of his nameless clients.

He led the way through the scattering of tables with varnish peeling from their tops and chairs with cracked plastic seats to the bar.

The bar was actually just two pre-War kitchen counter units that had been shoved together. They sat on a wooden floor that had been built out over the tracks from the crumbling edges of the subway platform, boards well-worn but fitted snugly together.

Behind the bar floated a Mister Handy with a bowler cap perched on its head.

Nick approached. "Kid, this is Whitechapel Charlie. Charlie - "

One eyestalk swiveled over to her, sizing her up and down. "Another one of your charity cases, Valentine? I don't do credit here. Caps upfront, or - "

She plunked a sack of caps onto the countertop. "I can pay."

That got the attention of all three eyes. "Now we're talkin'. What can I get you, miss?"

"A beer. And something pre-War, if you've got it?"

She hadn't realized eyebots could actually roll their eyes. "I got the finest meats on a stick outside of Diamond City here, and she comes in asking for something 'pre-War'."

She opened her mouth, but the bartender cut her off. "No, no, say no more. The customer is always right."

One arm reached under the counter and pulled out a packet of InstaMash. The Mister Handy buzzed it open with his saw, focused his laser on it for a couple seconds, and finally slapped it down on a plate in front of her, never once breaking eye contact. 

She swallowed. "...my beer?"

It followed, landing on the counter with a thump.

She hastily grabbed both before she could offend the bartender any further and glanced at Nick.

He waved her on. "Go ahead, kid. I've got some leads I want to follow up with Charlie here."

She nodded and headed for an empty table, settling in to eat.

When she heard the scrape of a chair, she looked up, expecting to see Nick.

Instead, the mayor of Goodneighbor stood across the table from her, holding the seat he'd just pulled out. He paused a moment before he sat.

"Mind if I join you?"

She blinked, the question startling her into a response. "No, go ahead."

Hancock smiled and spun the chair under his hand, settling into it with his arms propped along the backrest.

"Thought I'd play the gracious host and ask how you've been finding our fine neighborhood."

"Uh, good?"

He stared at her, then let out a laugh, and it took her a moment to catch on to her own accidental joke. She flushed.

"So," Hancock continued. "Did you find what you were looking for?"

"I don't know," she admitted.

"Ah, well, isn't that the way it always goes when we go rummaging around inside our own heads?" He paused. "Or in somebody else's."

Her head snapped up, and she stared at him. He met her eyes.

_She stood off to one side as Kellogg watched two Institute scientists arguing animatedly with each other. One was a blonde man in a white and green jumpsuit, the other a bald man in a white and black jumpsuit. Behind each man, a courser stood still and silent. She recognized both of them - she'd been attacked by the one behind black jumpsuit in the ruins of C.I.T., and only managed to escape with her life when the one behind green jumpsuit had shown up to interfere. She might not have gotten away from him, either, if a timely rescue from Preston and the Minutemen hadn't announced its imminent arrival through her radio._

_It occurred to her, standing there, listening to the scientists argue over her fate - over the_ Commonwealth's _fate - that these were men who were perfectly capable of sending their coursers to their deaths against each other, of treating the whole thing like an intellectual game of chess, the people living above their pieces, their creations the pawns they sacrificed on the surface._

But he was up here, same as she was, and the Institute was a threat to all of them.

Hancock drummed his fingers on the table. "You're a vault dweller." 

It wasn't a question.

"Is it that obvious?"

"As a Deathclaw in Diamond City."

She pushed the tepid mash around her plate with her fork, separating it out into different sized portions. The mottled tin of the plate appeared between the piles like cracks in the dry earth as she waited for his next words.

"Now here's the thing. I thought I knew about all vaults in the 'wealth." Hancock raised a hand, started ticking them off on his fingers. "75 and 95 are overrun by Gunners. The Triggermen hole themselves up in 114. The dwellers in 81 seem nice enough, but they tend to keep to themselves. So that's got me wondering - where did you come from?"

She stayed silent, fork still in hand, watching him.

The mayor pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of his pocket. He put it on the table, smoothed it out against the stained wood, and pushed it towards her. "This is you, isn't it?"

It was an issue of Publick Occurrences. The headline read _View from the Vault_.

She smiled ruefully. "I didn't realize Piper's paper had such a wide circulation. I'll have to congratulate her."

Hancock leaned back in his chair, settling in.

She set her fork down. "There's another vault, northwest of here, up near Concord. Vault 111. It's where I'm - " She could feel her mouth twist as she said the words. " - from."

The mayor folded his arms across his chest, black eyes inscrutable. She sighed and pushed her plate away from her, leaning back in her own chair. 

"How much do you know about the vaults?"

He shrugged. "Built before. Meant to protect the rich from the radiation and the riff-raff. Heard it didn't work out too well for most of them."

She sighed again and took a swig of her beer. It was warm. Of course it was warm. God, when was the last time she'd had a cold drink? 

"Yeah, that's what I thought, too. And maybe it did work out for a few of them. But not any of the ones I've been in. Not the Gunner's vaults. Not the Triggermen's. And not 111, either.

"Turns out the vaults weren't meant to keep us safe. They were experiments, all of them. 111 was meant to test 'cryogenic suspended animation'. And I guess it worked. At least on me."

Hancock raised what would have been an eyebrow. "And everyone else?"

She pulled her plate back towards her.

"Dead."

It turned out Hancock was as good at reading her as he was at reading his audience. He didn't push the matter.

"So, now that you've seen the good doctor, what's next for you and Valentine? You got a place to stay for the night?"

She shook her head. "Nick convinced me to grab a bite to eat, but we won't be staying."

Hancock frowned. "It's well after sundown. I'm sure I don't have to tell you, but the ruins outside the gate get a lot more dangerous after dark."

She sighed, swallowed the last bite of the now-cold mash, set her fork down, and sat back. "I know. But it would be even more dangerous for me to stay."

Hancock arched a brow at that. "I hope you're not impugning the character of the fair citizens of Goodneighbor."

She frowned. "Not dangerous for me. Dangerous for them."

The ghoul leaned exaggeratedly to one side, taking in Dogmeat snoozing gently under her chair, looking distinctly non-threatening as he drooled on her bag. Then he half-stood to take in the Gauss rifle slung over the back of her chair, out of easy reach. She flushed as he settled back into his seat.

"I don't doubt you can handle yourself, sister, but you might be overestimating the odds in your favor here."

She huffed in frustration. "That's not what I meant."

He leaned forward, relaxed, crossing his arms easily on the table. "Then why don't you tell me what you did mean?"

Fine. Two could play at this game.

She leaned back, folding her own arms across her chest. "The Institute is trying to kill me."

Whatever response she expected, it wasn't a laugh.

"Really, now. So did you like my little speech, then? I do it every once in awhile, in case they're listening in. With you in the neighborhood, it seemed as good a time as any. I want those Synth-makers to know that Goodneighbor is off limits. No one gets 'replaced' in my town."

"Well, I don't think they're trying to replace me, exactly. Just kill me. Or kidnap me." She ran a hand through short-cropped hair. "They can't seem to make up their minds about which."

His face hardened, black eyes glinting. "They'd still have to get to you first. And that ain't gonna happen. Not on my watch."

"Don't you ever worry about yourself?"

He pressed a hand to his heart in mock offense. "Are you implying the Institute wouldn't be interested in me?"

It was her turn to laugh, and god, it felt good. "No! I just don't think they could ever hope to replace you and get away with it." She imitated his gesture. "Any copy they made would be but a pale shadow of the original at best."

He grinned. "Well, now you flatter me."

A blush warmed her cheeks. He was still smiling at her, and she found herself smiling back.

"Sister, your concern is sweet, but in Goodneighbor, we take care of our own. And right now, that's what you are."

He jerked his thumb over his shoulder towards the stairs. "The Rexford isn't much to look at, but it's got real beds, and some of the doors even have working locks. If Clair or Marowski give you any trouble about the caps, just tell 'em I sent you."

She stood, leaving the cap from her drink on the table and dropping a couple more beside it. "No, I can afford it. But…" She met his eyes. "Thank you." 


	3. Cleaning Up the Neighborhood

Hancock watched the vault dweller make her way back over to the bar, where Nick and Charlie were still talking. Hancock guessed Nick was plying Charlie for all the good neighborhood gossip, picking up tips and leads wherever he could. 

Hancock could relate. It didn't do just to stay up to date with all the goings-on in Goodneighbor. The Commonwealth was a living, breathing thing - if one part of it got shot up, the rest of it was going to feel it. Hell, Goodneighbor wouldn't even exist if it weren't for Diamond City. 

So Hancock kept his people on the lookout for the Institute. He'd heard the news about the betrayal of the Minutemen in Quincy, and the raid on the Railroad at the Switchboard, and for a moment or two he'd despaired, just as he had after killing Finn. But he still kept a few of the Railroad's recruitment holos on the tables of the Statehouse, and now this vaultie was walking around in a Minuteman's uniform, so maybe things around the 'wealth were looking up again.

Hancock had given Charlie instructions to tell Nick whatever he wanted to know. But, knowing Charlie, he'd probably decided to be deliberately difficult about it. All the Mister Handy really wanted was to be a bartender, not a damn newsbot. Valentine would get what he was after, but he'd have to work for it.

Hancock suspected a small part of Nick might enjoy it. A little bit of the detective work back from his good old days.

The vaultie reached the bar, and Nick said something to Charlie and gestured to her. Charlie didn't exactly have a mouth Hancock could see open, but his eyes swiveled over to look at her, and the ghoul thought he could pick up the bartender's particular patois through the low murmur of voices and the clink of glass on glass. 

Curious, Hancock got up and ambled over to the bar. He arrived in time to catch the end of the dweller's response to Charlie.

"...don't do work unless I know who's paying the bills. Sorry."

Hancock wracked his brain, trying to remember what work he'd given out to the bartender to get done. But it wasn't that hard to figure out, really - there was only one job in Goodneighbor right now that Charlie would be giving to an outsider. 

He sidled over and leaned up against the bar on the other side of the vault dweller, keeping his voice nice and casual. "Oh yeah, that would be me. I forgot about that one." 

She started and turned to face him. " _You_ want the warehouses cleared out?"

Hancock shrugged, still slouched against the bar. "Well, like I said, everyone's welcome in Goodneighbor - so long as they play nice. And the Triggermen...well, I heard you 'n' Valentine had a run-in with them not too long ago. I don't need to tell you that they don't play nice."

She and Valentine exchanged a look. "No," she said slowly. "They usually don't."

"So you'll take the job?"

She tilted her head, studying him, and Hancock fought down the urge to squirm under her scrutinizing gaze. Finally, she nodded. "Yeah. We'll take the job."

Hancock pushed himself off the bar, satisfied. When he straightened to his full height, he stood an inch or two taller than her. "I'll tell you what. Since I'm the one that's asking you to do this, I'll help you get it done."

She blinked, then nodded again, and Hancock smiled. "Then it's a date."

It wasn't something you usually wanted in a bar, but just for once Hancock wished the lighting in the Third Rail were a bit better, so he could tell if a bit of a blush really did color her cheeks. It was only after she and Valentine had disappeared up the stairs that Hancock realized he still hadn't asked her name.

 

The next morning, Hancock was up early and back at the window. But this time, instead of watching the Memory Den, he was watching the Hotel Rexford.

The sun had almost finished burning off the morning mist when Nick and the vault dweller emerged. Nick looked the same as always, but the vault dweller had added some armor to her ensemble. A piece of combat armor was strapped to her chest. A rusted, dented pauldron lined with crude welds covered one shoulder, while stitched-together pieces of cracked, hardened leather protected the other leg. She even had a piece of synth-white polymer attached to her right forearm.

With them was a ghoul Hancock couldn't quite place. He squinted and waved Fahrenheit over. 

"Hey, Fahrenheit. You got a name on that guy?"

Fahrenheit looked over his shoulder, then shook her head. "Dunno. He's been stayin' at the Rexford for a while now. Doesn't come out of his room much. When he does, he keeps to himself. Mostly wanders around muttering about 'two hundred years' and a set of steak knives."

Hancock snapped his fingers. "The Vault-Tec rep."

Fahrenheit shrugged. "Sure, boss. Whatever you say."

Hancock returned his attention to the figures below.

As they crossed the square, he started to make out some of what they were saying.

"...you're sure? You're sure about this?" The ghoul's voice was anxious, almost pleading.

The vault dweller's reply was patient, but Hancock could hear a laugh bubbling up under her words. It sounded liked this conversation had been going on for some time. 

" _Yes_. Take this, go to Hangman's Alley." She pressed something into his hand, something Hancock couldn't see. "This will let you in the gate, past the defenses. There's food, water, and clothing there. Clean beds. A provisioner from Sanctuary should be by in a few days. You can travel back with them."

"And you promise? You promise you'll come visit me there?"

She nodded. "I _promise_. And when you get there, ask for Sturges. We've been needing someone with sales experience to help manage our trading post there."

The way the ghoul lit up, you would have thought he was a Glowing One. He started wringing her hand.

"Oh, thank you, thank you! Thank you so much! I won't forget this, I promise!"

She did laugh this time, and finally, after some effort, managed to extricate her hand.

"Do you think he'll be okay?" she asked Nick as the ghoul practically ran for the gates of Goodneighbor. "I know we gave him the 10mm, but - " Not her own, Hancock noted, that was still tucked into her belt.

Nick clapped a hand on a leather-clad shoulder. "Relax, kid. If he's survived the Commonwealth this long, he can make one trip across the Fens."

She nodded, and looked like she was about to say something else - 

\- but then, as though she felt his eyes on her, she glanced up. Seeing Hancock staring, she smiled and gave a little wave. Nick followed her gaze, his yellow eyes steady on Hancock. 

Caught out, Hancock could only tip his hat in return.

From behind him, he heard a snort. "Smooth, boss."

 

They made short work of the warehouses.

Nick could handle a revolver, and he could make a shotgun dance - and the vault dweller? Well. She apparently knew her way around a pistol.

The Gauss rifle stayed strapped tightly to her back, but when she plunged a shot of pyscho jet into her leg, let out a guttural scream, and brought down the last five Triggermen with as many shots, Hancock thought he might have fallen just a little bit in love.

He ducked out from behind the now-bullet-pocked brick wall, and Nick emerged from the doorway where he'd taken shelter. The vaultie rose from where she'd been crouched in the center of the room, breathing hard and a little shaky on her feet. She'd flung herself out there in a jet-fueled rage, and patches of grime from the warehouse floor now clung to the back of her coat.

Hancock squatted down to check the bodies, and a moment later, she was kneeling next to him on the bloodied floor, doing the same. The ghoul was so intent on his search for a reason why the Triggermen were moving in - a note, a holotape, _anything_ \- that it took him a few heartbeats as they moved from body to body to realize she was checking their pulses, not rummaging through their pockets.

Nothing. Hancock sighed and sat back on his heels as the vault dweller straightened.

Hancock glanced around and felt a wry smile tug at the corner of his mouth.

"Well," he said. "It looks like you're owed some caps from Charlie."


	4. Won't You Be My Neighbor

The vault dweller stared down at the plate in front of her and wondered what she'd gotten herself into this time.

Nick had left her, heading back to Diamond City. When Hancock had invited her to down to the Third Rail with a rather charming smile and an offer to treat her to lunch after she'd picked up the reward, she'd turned to Nick, but he'd shaken his head.

"Part of it is yours, Nick," she protested.

He waved her off. "The agency's been doing just fine since you pulled me out of that vault, and Ellie told me you didn't take any money for that. Keep the caps. Put 'em to good use."

"Will I at least see you back in Diamond City?"

She must have given him a bit of a helpless, pathetic look, because his face softened, and he laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Of course. We've still got quite the case to solve, after all - "

He broke off when she flung her arms around him and hugged him as tight at she could.

"I'll be back this evening," she mumbled into his jacket.

His pats on her back were a little awkward, but when she let him go, he was smiling. "I'll be there, kid. You'll always know where to find me."

He adjusted his hat, pulling the brim low as if to hide his smile, and headed for the gates of Goodneighbor.

So now she was back in The Third Rail, staring down at the food in front of her and questioning a few of her recent life choices.

She had, almost exclusively since she left the vault, been eating two-hundred-year-old, pre-packaged, and thoroughly irradiated food. She'd supplemented her diet by harvesting the same wild plants that she'd planted in Sanctuary, eating meat from the few animals that she still considered recognizable - brahmin and radstags and mirelurks, which were just barely close enough to crabs for her to stomach - and kept the rads under control by dosing herself regularly with Rad-X. 

She'd rather starve than eat anything from the overgrown bugs that infested the Commonwealth. She made regular deliveries of the "meat" from the radroaches, bloatflies, and bloodbugs she killed to Polly at Choice Cuts in Diamond City, but she'd rather walk straight into the Glowing Sea without power armor on then put any of it in her mouth.

What was sitting on her plate now was something in-between.

"What _kind_ of meat on a stick?" she'd asked Charlie cautiously. 

"Only the finest squirrel and iguana this side of the pond!"

Well, she at least recognized the names.

But ordering it had put her back in the bartender's good graces. Rather than a generic beer slammed down in front of her, she'd been offered a selection of Gwinnett's, complete with the labels still attached. She'd chosen a pale ale, while the mayor had picked out a dark stout.

Looking down at her plate now, she thought she could tell the difference between the squirrel and iguana skewers. The iguana meat looked...greener.

She grimaced. As inconspicuously as she could, she slid one of the iguana skewers off her plate and scraped the meat off with the sole of her boot. Dogmeat happily disposed of the evidence as she slipped the empty skewer back onto her plate and tried to pretend like nothing had happened.

"So," Hancock said, a little too casually, and she glanced up at his tone. "I wouldn't have thought killing would come so easy to someone from before the war."

"It didn't."

 

She'd killed the first living person she'd seen in the Commonwealth.

She'd spent weeks in Sanctuary Hills after she'd staggered out of the vault into the blinding sun, long enough for her hands to blister and callus, following the instructions pre-loaded onto her Pipboy for survival. 

She'd cleared out all the houses that had survived and cleared away the ones that hadn't. She'd sorted, sorted, sorted - sheets of steel, planks of wood, chunks of ceramic and concrete blocks - even shards of glass, which cut her hands until she wrapped them in scraps of cloth.

Someone - she didn't know who, or when, or what had happened to them, or if they'd even survived - had set up a workshop in one of the open-air garages that was still standing - her open-air garage. It was hard to think of anything here as hers anymore - she had to reclaim it all pile by pile, piece by piece.

She slept outside, on a two-hundred-year-old mattress on top of a two-hundred-year-old frame that she'd dragged out of the house - her house - and tucked into the corner of the garage, up against the house. A crude wall of aluminum siding sheltered her from the elements, and the foot of her bed was open to the night air.

She sorted screws and springs, circuits and crystals, crumbled bits of cork and melted blobs of lead and gold into the cracked plastic drawers of the workbenches. She scoured an old fridge with Abraxo and stacked it full of boxes and cans of pre-War food; she sanded down an old dresser and filled it with clothes.

She foraged through the weeds that had sprouted up everywhere to find waving stalks of grain that cut her hand like razors and sprawling vines of gourds that had probably once been pumpkins. She found some sort of growth she could only describe as the skin of a tomato stretched over the rotting core of a peeled potato, and vegetables mercifully more familiar, like corn and carrots. 

With Codsworth's help, she drilled a well in the dirt next to the house and installed a water pump there. She mended once-white picket fences gathered from yards up and down the street and fenced in a garden. She dragged over bag after bag of fertilizer, tilled the soil, and began to plant.

The work left her body sore and aching and her mind mercifully blank. She collapsed into bed at dusk and rose again at dawn, and it was only the shortening of the days that roused her from the routine into which she'd fallen.

She didn't know exactly what the war had done to the weather, but she'd emerged from the vault, according to her Pipboy, in late October. It could snow any day now, she hadn't been able to find enough glass to build a greenhouse, and her plants hadn't been in the ground long enough to do more than sprout their first green shoots.

If she was going to survive, she had to go look for survivors.

 

She left Sanctuary the next day.

Codsworth fretted as she checked over the straps on her rucksack. 

"Oh, ma'am, are you certain about this? Who knows what irradiated horrors might await you beyond these walls?"

She wasn't certain, not at all. But in spite of everything, she laughed and looked around them. "What walls, Codsworth?"

"Metaphorically speaking, ma'am."

She sighed and stooped again to her pack. "I have to go, Codsworth. I have to find out." 

She tightened another strap, then stopped and looked up at him. "I mean, don't you want to know if we're the only ones left?"

He was quiet for a moment, save for the muted rumbling of his hover jet.

"It would be pleasing to discover that other General Atomics creations such as myself had survived," he finally allowed. She nodded, and hoisted the rucksack onto her back.

"At least allow me to come with you, then, ma'am. I may not be a Mr. Gutsy, but I daresay I could fend off a beast with a flamethrower or a buzzsaw." He whirred his threateningly.

And oh, how she wanted him to, but he couldn't. "Codsworth, I need you to stay here. If - " Her voice suddenly felt thick, and she swallowed. "If we're the only ones left, and these crops die..."

She didn't finish the sentence. She hadn't looked too closely at the thought of what she'd do if it turned out they were, in fact, all alone in the world.

But Codsworth looked determined. He brought one of his arms to an eyestalk in an approximation of a salute. "Then you can count on me, ma'am!"

"I know I can, Codsworth," she said, and, seized by a sudden impulse, wrapped her arms around him.

She felt a start run through his metal frame, a little frisson of electricity racing over his plating, but he patted her hesitantly on the back with one arm.

It could very well have been two hundred years with only his self-maintenance protocols for repairs, but she thought she heard a quaver in his voice when she released him.

"Be careful, ma'am."

"You, too, Codsworth."

 

She reached Concord around midday, with the sun high in the sky. It looked like there was a storm brewing, off to the east, but above her the clouds were white and fluffy.

She'd followed the road. There was no particular reason to, she supposed, except it led into Concord, and that was where she'd decided to go.

As she'd walked, she'd noticed the silence. 

No cars rumbled past her on the road. No electricity hummed through the power lines she passed under or carefully stepped over. All she could hear as she walked was the sound of her footsteps on the road, the wind in her ears, and the beating of her own heart.

It was the quietest she'd ever heard.

The dog who'd started following her at the Red Rocket station was still trotting by her side. She wasn't quite sure what to make of it. She'd killed her share of irradiated roaches, which were giant now and sometimes glowed, and she'd seen two-headed deer bounding through the woods off in the distance, but the dog looked like...a dog. A completely normal dog.

The road into Concord was lined with evidence that there had been some survivors of the war, at least in the days immediately after the bombs fell, although the signs weren't terribly hopeful. Rotting wooden traffic barriers were scattered across the road. In between them, sandbags had been stacked into crude semi-circular barricades, big enough for one or two people to hide behind - if they ducked. 

And then, of course, there was the figure standing in middle of the street. 

Her heart leapt in her chest. "Hey! HEY!" she yelled, and started to run, because oh god, _oh god_ , she wasn't alone in the world after all, there were others, there were survivors, and now the woman was charging towards her, screaming back, and the dog at her side was growling -

The first bullet hit the pavement by her feet.

Another bullet struck the sandbags next to her as she skidded to a stop, dumbfounded, mind going blank.

She fumbled for her pistol. It was an old pre-war thing, the metal of the barrel rusted and discolored, the brown plastic of the grip scuffed and scratched where she'd picked it up off the floor of the vault, not far from the skeletal hand from which it had fallen. She'd cleaned it, loaded it and forgotten about it, never expecting to have to use it on anything but the overly large bugs that occasionally tried to sting her or suck her blood.

And now it was stuck in the belt loop of her jumpsuit.

A third bullet whizzed past her ear. Adrenaline surged through her. The fabric ripped. The gun tore free.

She raised it and started firing, and she didn't stop until the body of the woman collapsed at her feet.

She staggered back from it, stumbling in a pothole in the road and falling back against the curved wall of sandbags, knocking the wind from her. The woman was dead. Her body lay face down on the pavement, a small mercy, but she could see the exit wounds and the blood pooling underneath her. 

The woman was dead, and she had killed her.

She dragged herself into the lee of the sandbags' curve, into the small shelter they offered, out of the wind and almost - almost - out of sight of the body of the woman she'd killed. Pressing her back to the wall, she clutched her knees to her chest, curled up into a ball, and stayed that way.

When a chill wind raised goosebumps on her arms, she finally stirred and raised her head. The storm that had been off on the horizon was now almost overhead, bringing with it ominous rumbles of thunder and the dark promise of rain.

She uncurled stiffly and forced herself to her feet. She needed to move now, to find shelter from the storm and whatever the strange green crackling in the air around her foretold.

She should - she should search the body of the woman, she thought, all the survival guides she'd read in the glowing light of her Pipboy flashing through her mind. But even as she thought it, her mind rebelled, her eyes skittering away from the body every time she even tried to look at it.

The woman was probably a Psycho addict, she'd realize much later, remembering the dozens of empty syringes scattered around the body, spilling from a hole in a sack around her chest, and the canister attached to the gas mask at her belt. But all she knew then was that, for the second time in as many months, her world had just been turned upside down.

She picked up her pack, jammed the gun clumsily into her pocket, and gave the cooling body a wide berth as she trudged into Concord.


End file.
